Management of safety and health
The OZ Minerals Sustainability Management Standards incorporate safety and health aspects and provide a uniform framework for managing safety and health across the company.
We are continually focused on strengthening safety leadership across OZ Minerals to ensure leaders at all levels across the business demonstrate a commitment to safety and actively follow up on safety issues. As part of the five Key Safety Actions, weekly management walk-arounds of various areas of the operation were conducted at Prominent Hill.
Contractor management
We aim to ensure the management systems and procedures of contractors engaged by OZ Minerals are consistent with our Values, Code of Conduct and Sustainability Standards. In developing a consistent and aligned approach to safety and health management, our aim is to remove duplication of effort and develop shared safety cultures. Our OZ Minerals Contractor Selection and Management Standard addresses contractor selection requirements, orientations and inductions, contractor monitoring, reporting, auditing and record keeping.
Safety and health risk management
Our approach to safety and health risk management is to ensure that these aspects are managed consistently across the company. Our OZ Minerals Risk and Opportunity Management Standard outlines our risk management process:
- Facilities shall identify and prioritise risks and/or hazards and assess their risks/opportunities according to the Team Based Risk Assessment Methodology.
- Risks shall be documented in a facility risk register.
- People who facilitate risk assessments shall have risk facilitation experience.
- Hazard analysis is required when a new job, process, piece of equipment, chemical or additional exposure occurs.
- Where tasks are risk rated as high or extreme, mitigation plans shall be developed and implemented as a priority.
OZ Minerals recognises the importance of providing our people with the necessary skills and tools to manage safety and health risks within their workplaces. Our induction programs contain content on basic hazard identification techniques and additional training in this area is also provided. Prominent Hill trained 369 employees and contractors in hazard identification techniques and risk assessment during 2009.
Audit
During 2009, a number of internal audits were conducted. An independent audit of performance against our Sustainability Management Standards is planned for the Prominent Hill operation in early 2010.
Actions to address non-compliances are tracked and reviewed quarterly by the Executive Committee and the Board Sustainability Committee.
Safety and Health Communications
Each OZ Minerals operation has a health and safety committee to ensure health and safety matters are discussed and communicated. The committees generally represent all sections of the workforce. Some large contractors have their own safety and health committee structures in place. The committees are made up of elected employees and nominated management representatives. The committees’ functions include the provision of feedback to management on safety and health leadership, hazard and risk identification, inspections, suggestions for amendments to standards and improvement issues. At Prominent Hill each department onsite engages the workforce in daily Pre-start Information (PSI) meetings and regular safety toolbox meetings. The PSI meetings provide an opportunity to discuss safety related information from the previous day along with upcoming safety information. The Exploration teams conduct regular safety toolbox meetings as well.
Additional safety and health communication processes include the generation and distribution of Significant Incident Alerts and monthly sustainability performance reports to all personnel.
Safety programs
In response to risk assessments and other improvement initiatives, a range of specific programs were implemented during the reporting period that were intended to address safety challenges. As an example, at Prominent Hill, a procedure was developed and a program implemented around lightning safety. Other specific areas of improvement included remote area travel and working alone, fire protection and prevention, traffic management, working at heights and confined space. Another area of focus has been the delivery of the five Key Safety Action program, which consisted of a Quarterly Extreme Safety Focus Topic, One on One Safety Discussions, Challenge Unsafe Acts, High Impact Safety Sessions, Management walk-arounds of operations areas.
Health programs
Our goal is to minimise health related risks across the company. Each of our operations has health and wellbeing programs in place for both employees and contractors.
The table below outlines some of the programs that were implemented during the reporting period.
| Operation | Program name | Program description |
|---|---|---|
| Exploration | Occupational health awareness | Awareness packs detailing prevention, symptoms and treatment for malaria and dengue fever. |
| Group Office | Skin patrol | Skin checks were offered at the Group office. |
| Vaccinations | H1N1 vaccinations were offered to all staff. | |
| Prominent Hill | Healthy living | The Healthy Living Coordinator coordinates sporting teams, runs regular sporting events and daily aerobics/weights sessions. There is active hydration testing to ensure employees are hydrated. |
| Skin patrol | All personnel onsite, including contractors, offered a skin lesion check. | |
| Health checks | All personnel onsite, including contractors, offered a general health assessment. | |
| Communicable diseases | Presentations and campaigns associated with communicable diseases. Vaccinations against H1N1 were offered. |
Medical and health monitoring
Our operations have processes in place to conduct medical and health checks for employees during employment and before employment.
Our most significant occupational health risks are:
- silicosis from dust exposure
- skin cancers from sun exposure
- exposure to heat stress
- exposure to noise
- exposure to radioactive material present in the ore and concentrate
- exposure to Malaria and Dengue fever (Cambodia).
Fitness for work
OZ Minerals operations have fitness-for-work programs in place to ensure that all persons at our operations present for work in a condition that will not pose a safety risk to themselves or others.
At OZ Minerals, the fitness-for-work program includes a wide range of activities and education, including fatigue management, employee assistance programs, functional assessments, access to fitness centres or activities, along with alcohol and drug programs.
In 2009, a Fatigue Management Procedure was developed for Prominent Hill. The focus of this procedure was to provide guidance on how best to manage fatigue in the workplace. Furthermore, Prominent Hill developed guidelines regarding the management of heat stress to assist us in protecting our people from health and safety risks associated with this.
OZ Minerals is committed to educating our people on matters relating to alcohol and drugs. This education is supported by testing programs for both alcohol and drugs at our administration offices and operations. The OZ Minerals blood alcohol limit is 0.00 per cent.
Fitness-for-work programs are generally coordinated at an operation level, with similarities in approach across the company. The intent of all these programs is to provide our people with the necessary education and information to self manage their own fitness-for-work.
